The Cultural Legitimacy of the European University1

1. The author's special thanks go to by Ms Raluca Buciuman and Mr Ştefan Oltean who translated the present paper/article into English.

Abstract

If we take into account the growing functional differentiation in the late modernity, and the changes in society, knowledge, as well as the new needs, then there are reasons to question the activity profile of many institutions of today (political, military, communicational, commercial, etc.). In the case of the university, the changes involve fundamental aspects, such that the second oldest institution in Europe – after the Church – is requested to legitimise itself once again in a society already torn away from the continuity of history and reconfigured as a result of reorganisation of its own resources: money, administrative power, knowledge, information, culture. The author approaches the legitimacy of the European university, its cultural legitimacy by evoking the initial legitimization of universities which modelled the history of European higher education, by identifying the mission and the functions of the European university, and by showing the challenges that the legitimization of the European university faces today, and by highlighting its cultural profile.

1. The author's special thanks go to by Ms Raluca Buciuman and Mr Ştefan Oltean who translated the present paper/article into English.

Notes

1. The author's special thanks go to by Ms Raluca Buciuman and Mr Ştefan Oltean who translated the present paper/article into English.

2. Glen McGee approaches the philosophical bases of the clinical and moral problems linked to the new biotechnologies.

3. Jaroslav Pelikan who cites J. M. Cameron: “…modern thinking on university is a series of footnotes to Newman's lectures and essays”.